Sphag and bag...
 

Hi,
I'm still trying to save my one plant (catt) that I posted on my other threads. I want to try the famous sphagnum moss in a ziploc bag with the plant and it's root. How much moss goes into the bag and do I change it at all? How long does it take to develop roots where it would be ok to repot? I also bought some premium cattleya medium and it is in an oxygen dual plastic pot. It dried out and killed most of the roots of another plant. We have been watering twice a week, but it seems like these pots or medium is not working. Puzzled.....:(

p.s. I couldn't find just sphagnum moss by itself so I bought it with peat moss. Has anyone tried that?
Thank you!

No, peat moss for orchids, holds too much water. Spag. moss is sold most everywhere. Try Lowe's or Home depot. If the plant has little other hope then you can try spag and bag. Just a handful of moist spag. in baggie. Do not seal, but open wide once a day for fresh air. I think it takes up to three weeks.
Never worked for me. If you do a search you may find how other have done this with success.

Hi this is what I did with a Phal.Attachment 52227

Attachment 52228
I'm only a novice, but the spag is moist, wrapped in paper towel, loosely. Tied with florist wire. Ziploc bag is open, occasionally blowing into bag with carbon dioxide. Stood up under bench. You can see little roots starting to grow.
Others might be able to help you with some more hints.
Best of luck.

I am a greenie when it comes to orchids. I know peat moss is highly acidic, and i'm not sure if orchids like that.

That is a great help to know I can buy it at some place like Lowe's or Home D. Thanks!

Thank you for the pictures! That helps a lot. I am a little confused, I thought when in the bag, the plant is not suppose to touch the moss at all. Does anyone know about this? Thanks!

In my opinion, and others may ahve different experience and thoughts -

Sphag and bag works (sometimes) by keeping the orchid (without a good root system) in a high humidity environment. The orchid looses less moisture to transpiration in high humidity, so doesn't have to take in as much water. This keeps it alive until it has a chance to develops more roots.

The danger is getting the humidity high without keeping the orchid totally wet, which is probably why you have to do sphag and bag to begin with. If the orchid is actually in the sphagnum, it will never dry out, and you know where that goes. Also the reason for periodic opening and "airing out".

The trick is getting the humidity high enough without keeping it too wet. Whether you do it with frequent misting, a finer medium than usual and more frequent watering, or sphag and bag probably doesn't make too much difference.

I've had some success with all of the above, but sphag and bag requires the least effort. The finer medium and more frequent watering is more work but requires less adaptation to "normal" conditions once the roots start. The frequent misting is just more effort than I usually have, but is probably closest to nature in rainy season. All methods probably work best when the orchid would normally be growing roots, and fail most often (for me) in the winter.

Again, just an opinion, but keeping the plant in a lower metabolic state (slightly cooler and more shade than usual) gives it a chance to start to develop roots before the end.

I appreciate all your input. I live in Colorado and that is 3/4 the problem....we have no humidity here. But I actually didn't start having a problem until I changed to a premium catt medium and then it dried out too fast. So I guess it is in the experimenting that will make the difference. Thanks a lot for your help.

This may sound like a strange suggestion, but have you considered water culture? Basically you clean up the reamining root system to get rid of all the dead roots, then suspend the plant in a container of water so that only the base of the plant is in the water. Change the water once a week or so. This method works extremely well to kick start roots on Catts, and I've also used it will success with a rootless Den. Once the plant has developed some new roots it can be potted up again.


There are some great threads on this topic, i'm trying to find them.

I actually immediately put the catt in some water (to keep it from dying more) but thought I read somewhere that orchids don't make roots that way. I currently have it in some sp. moss and peat moss but don't think the peat moss is a good idea. I may go back to the animated water trick since you said catts like that. Thanks for the info!